Smeagol is Free!
A hermitudinal view of...stuff...


6.05.2005  

Fathomless

The following is from part of yesterday's journaling. Last night I read it over the phone to Pablo, and after musing over that conversation I thought it'd be good to post here, too.

1 Peter 1:13
Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

As I look at this verse, several things stand out. First, mental preparation is not separate from practical application. In pondering the struggles and failures of recent weeks, one conviction that has come forth has been the need to take practical steps of obedience to root out sin. How do I prepare for such action? Well, it's that which is laid out in the Scriptures: prayer, confession of sin, repentance, fellowship, worship, fasting, preaching unto ourselves, meditating upoon the Word, and so on and so forth. Yet, I would also think that such preparation is, in and of itself, a sort of "action." Second, the need to fix our hopes upon the grace of Christ is not a light one. If not the hope of Christ's grace, then what hope do we have? To whom or to what do we look? For whose or for the sake of what do we prepare and act? As Paul said, "to live is Christ, but to die is gain." Why gain? The grace of Christ to be revealed! "Yet to live on in the flesh will mean fruitful labor." The very notion of being in and upheld by Christ's grace right now is nevertheless a surpassing hope, one that undergirds and strengthens the hope that we have to look forward to at Christ's return! Third, that very grace was what Christ looked forward to while on the cross. How so? It was "for the hope set before Him" that He endured the cross. Isaiah 53 speaks of Christ seeing His "offspring" as a result of His being crushed and rendered a guilt offering. Wow...Lord, You look forward to pouring out Your grace, don't You? That's partly why Paul says that the Father, having already given over the Son to suffering and death, will not hold back any good thing from those who love Him, those whom He has called. It's because You look forward to pouring out Your grace not only now, but forevermore, with an exuberance and delight that I can only begin to fathom...and will forevermore only begin to fathom.

posted by Bolo | 12:12 PM
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